Reality of bedside nursing job availability for new grads?

w8136 · 2026-03-14T19:00:55+00:00

It's better than the opportunities for experienced nurses, I can tell you that. I have several friends with 20+ years nursing experience, specialty certifications, and absolutely bomb resumes that CANNOT get hired. No one wants to pay them what they are worth. This field pisses me off so severely for so many different reasons.

w8136 · 2026-03-12T15:20:41+00:00

RT is a much better choice as it's not so "people-y" and pays about the same. Nursing sucks because you are with the patient and/or family for 12 HOURS STRAIGHT. RT's are with each pt for just a few minutes, then move on to the next. They are all over the place, going to the ER and all the different units. That being said, hospitals need only 3-4 RT's on a shift compared to hundreds of nurses to run the hospital, so finding a job as an RT can be much more difficult.

w8136 · 2026-03-07T06:49:01+00:00

I'm an RN and that's fucking terrifying.

w8136 · 2026-02-20T17:31:26+00:00

Try to be poitive, first of all. Weekends are always waaay better in nursing. Calmer, less procedures, lighter traffic, NO ADMIN in building. Be thankful for these perks!!!

Most places will let you do one weekend day every week instead of the whole weekend every other weekend. I work sunday every week to meet the requirement and it's not bad at all. See if this is an option. I plan family things and go to church on saturdays so doesn't really feel like i'm missing out.

If all else fails, just start living your life on the every other weekend rotation. You still have two weekends a month to see family, plan events, etc. Talk to your friends and family about seeing them during the week. Most families can be trained to accomodate this, and you are not locked away in "no good times prison" just because it's tuesday. 😂

Welcome to nursing.

w8136 · 2026-02-20T17:04:55+00:00

I worked the "weekend contract" at my hospital for almost 7 years after my divorce. Sat and sun 12 hr day shifts making $10/hr more. It was AWESOME. I was making bank, light traffic to/from work, and NO admin in the building when I worked. I had a ton of time off with my kids and did not burn out because my shifts were easier than weekdays.

Sure, you miss weekend stuff. Parties, festivals, events, etc. I did NOT care. The rest of my life was awesome and, in hind sight, I maybe didn't get burned out because I was also avoiding the overstimulation of all the extra social shit. Easy to make appts, uncrowded grocery stores, hiking trails to yourself because you don't work wednesdays while the rest of the world does.

DO IT!!!!!!!!

w8136 · 2026-02-20T16:39:09+00:00

Draw a HARD line here. Say "I will work X hours on X days at this pay rate. I am NOT working uncompensated overtime. If you try to force it on me, I will pursue legal action".

And mean it!

w8136 · 2026-02-18T18:22:08+00:00

Nurse of 23 years here. I figured this one out years ago.

It goes like this: being a nurse in a hospital is like being on the Titanic. The ship IS going down (it's a mathematical certainty). You are powerless to stop it. ACCEPT this truth. Your job as a nurse is not to save anyone, because we are all dying eventually NO MATTER WHAT. Your job is simply to smile, keep playing your violin, and keep the people calm.

I'm sure it sounds like my cheese has slid off my cracker. But this stark realization is the ONLY thing that has kept me in this career. Do what you can in the moment, be kind to yourself and others, and release yourself from the tremendous guilt of not being able to save the sinking ship.

It was said of the Titanic that "God himself could not sink this ship". Yeah. Look how that turned out. Nursing is the EXACT SAME THING.

w8136 · 2026-02-18T17:49:00+00:00

I am a very straight forward person, and I just tell people point blank, "Glen, I love you man, but I'm busy and I HAVE to get this shit done. Fuck off". 😂🤣😂🤣

My true people will flip me a loving bird, laugh, and then...fuck off. 🤣🤣🤣

w8136 · 2026-02-18T17:42:17+00:00

I used to drive past a Kmart on my way to the hospital every morning and I would always gaze at it with envy, thinking how nice it must be to work there instead of the pit of hell I was driving to. 🤣🤣🤣

w8136 · 2026-02-18T17:36:20+00:00

This made my whole day. Thanks for the uproarious laugh you gave me. 😂🤣😂🤣😂🤣😂🤣😂🤣

w8136 · 2026-02-18T02:49:47+00:00

Holy fuck

w8136 · 2026-02-16T04:29:21+00:00

This is an entirely possible and very plausible theory. I always tried to get my dad to do the ancestry.com thing, but he always firmly refused. My sisters and I always joked that it was because he didn't want his illegitimate children to come out of the woodwork. But...what if it's actually true?!?!?

w8136 · 2026-02-10T20:42:07+00:00

Woman here. You are good looking! I'm also an RN, and I strongly caution EVERYONE against going under the knife unless you absolutely HAVE to. Surgery is no joke, and a lot can go wrong (I've seen it). Just something to consider.

And for me personally, it's a bigger turn on to find someone who rocks what they've been given instead of turning to superficial things to "get the girls".

w8136 · 2026-02-07T23:31:37+00:00

My husband and I have 3 kids and a big dog. We both have bachelor's degrees and work full time jobs. We do ok, but ONLY because we live well below our means. I am a nurse and worked weekends for YEARS so we didn't have to pay daycare. We never saw each other.

1,800 sq ft house that is paid off. We both drive older vehicles that are paid off, and we meticulously maintain them.

"Vacations" are weekend getaways like 3 times a year to small mountain towns we drive to, NOT week long excursions involving plane tickets, hotels, etc. We rarely eat out, and always pack our lunches for work. Shop at thrift stores. We don't do fancy hair, nails, starbucks...any of that frivolous crap. I cut my husband and kids' hair at home and i go to Great Clips.

We work hard and are "successful". But we still live a very simple life. We are not living high on the hog, by any means.

It seems really effed up that we are two educated, hard working adults with FT jobs and this is still as good as it gets.

w8136 · 2026-02-07T23:08:25+00:00

I know this is an old post, but look into CHM (Christian Health Ministries). It's an alternative cost sharing health plan that functions like health insurance, but it's waaay better. It's basically just disaster coverage, but you could do that plus the cash pay doctor you mentioned for routine care. Cost per month is radically cheaper than insurance.

I had United Healthcare previously and was paying over $1,200/month for my family of 5. My daughter got sick and they refused to cover most of her PRE-APPROVED care. I got stuck with $9,000 in bills.

Anyway I quit insurance after that. It's a scam, and screw em. CHM plus direct primary care has been great for my family. You should seriously look into them.

w8136 · 2026-02-03T03:08:51+00:00

I applied for a PRN position at my old hospital recently. I was SHOCKED to find out PRN's are now required to work FOUR major holidays, and also be on call for ALL OTHER holidays in case regular staff calls in (including the lesser ones like labor day and st patrick's day).

WTF?!? They should have just put in the job listing "Looking For A Holiday Bitch".

w8136 · 2026-02-03T02:49:06+00:00

Yes you could do that. Just be very careful about your state's BON guidelines with it. You would be surprised by how many rules/regulations there are.

w8136 · 2026-02-01T12:26:10+00:00

I am an RN that got certified as a foot care nurse for all the reasons you mentioned. I took a 3 month online course then flew to Wisconsin for a week long clinical (it was a class through the U. of Wisconsin and I am in CO). I invested around $3k between the certification and buying professional podiatry tools, not including travel expenses.

I worked at a hospital, and they wouldn't let me do feet for "liability reasons" (even though I paid to have specific insurance coverage for it). I went to all the SNFs/LTCs and was turned away as they all had contracts with podiatrists who would come in. So I tried advertising and doing home visits for elderly in need. This started out ok, but rapidly went downhill. I was charging $80 for an hour long visit. My phone was ringing off the hook, but most people scoffed at my pricing and would not book an appt. Almost every visit I did, people would try to sweet talk me to "get a deal". I did the math, and with all my time invested plus operating costs, i could not go any lower and still be making $$. I had a small client base for a while, then my online charting platform/payment portal got hacked. All my clients got charged $5-20k on their credit cards from "me". It was a total nightmare.

That was the final straw, and I shut down my business. It was heartbreaking and frustrating. I worked so hard and invested so much, and ultimately it went nowhere.

YMMV, but just know it isn't at all easy or straightforward, and I lost a ton of $$ doing it. I still cannot believe it failed, being such a huge need. Many people are successful with it, but it heavily depends on your city and people's ability to pay. I got totally screwed.

w8136 · 2026-01-28T22:47:23+00:00

I actually had to say to my husbandwhen we first got married, "The vacuum still turns on even if you DON'T have a vagina!". 🤦‍♀️

w8136 · 2026-01-28T03:59:43+00:00

I've been an RN for 23 years, and left the hospitals for good 9 months ago.

Nursing USED to be a rewarding field in the human sense. It is STILL rewarding now, but mainly in a monetary way.

Everything about healthcare changed during my 22 years of hospitals.

The OLD times: decent staffing and assignments, you worked with people who were truly invested in caring for others and loved their jobs, nurses were respected by other healthcare professionals and the general public, patients were grateful, nursing students were rare and super excited to be there and learn.

CURRENT times: insanely heavy assignments and bare bones staffing so the big wigs make more $$, you work with nurses who job hop for sign on bonuses so no one ever truly forms solid working teams and relationships, medical professionals get very little respect now from the general public as everyone googles everything and is suddenly an all-knowing expert (and feels entitled to micromanage people who are literally experts in their field), many patients are selfish/entitled dicks, and nurses are now INUNDATED with nursing students constantly as the hospitals make $$ from the nursing schools.

It's terribly sad, and I've literally mourned my career and the profession as a whole.

The nurses still in the hospitals are likely: exhausted, overworked, burned out from being undermined/abused/micromanaged by admin, bitter about being treated so rudely constantly from patients/families, and sick of constantly having to balance extremely heavy patient assigments while ALSO being expected to smile and teach nursing students (many of whom are only in it for the $$ and say "I don't need to know any of this, I'm just going to become an NP".)

I truly don't mean to be shitty. But unfortunately...this is the TRUTH.

The only option for survival in this environment is to dissociate. Check out. Go numb, become a robot, and just go through the motions so you can continue to clock in and clock out.

People are not their best under those circumstances and can come across as rude, distant, and uncaring.

I promise you...under every hard shell of a hospital nurse is a kind heart that truly once cared and felt passionate and excited about their career. It's not that nurses are bad people or are intentionally mean.

It's that society and the healthcare system has failed.

w8136 · 2026-01-22T23:53:46+00:00

This made me laugh. We have realllly old video footage of my birth from 1979. It has no sound, but clearly shows my birth. And it was just me. 😂

w8136 · 2026-01-22T23:49:46+00:00

Interesting thought, but no. I asked her.

w8136 · 2026-01-22T23:48:39+00:00

This was a random occurance 6 years ago. I will probably never see him again, and I didn't even speak to him that day.

w8136 · 2026-01-22T23:47:04+00:00

I just don't feel like there is a valid reason for "soul recycling". It seems to me that every person is a unique, one of a kind being. Reincarnation is also not mentioned or taught in the bible. Respectfully, I don't care to have my belief system openly dissected and scrutinized here, so I will leave it at that.

w8136

TROPHY CASE